Once known as Anakin Skywalker, expert pilot and hero, Vader studied the ways of the Force under young Jedi Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi. His impatience with the Jedi training made him susceptible to the dark side, which corrupted him as he gave in to his anger and aggression. Vader was almost killed in a confrontation with Kenobi, and was forced to adopt his current life support systems and fearsome body armor.

Allying himself with the evil Senator Palpatine, Vader hunted down and destroyed the remaining Jedi, enabling the future Emperor to seize control of the galaxy. Palpatine made him commander of the Imperial Fleet, charging Lord Darth Vader with using his mastery of the dark side to destroy the Rebel Alliance. His goal was almost accomplished, as only the Millennium Falcon's last second interference prevented Vader from destroying Luke Skywalker's Red-5 X-wing before it could deliver its deadly proton torpedo blast down the thermal exhaust port.

What Star Wars collection wouldn’t be complete without Darth Vader in it? Thankfully when the revival of the Star Wars 3.75” came to pass, Darth Vader was already in the plans to be part of the first wave. In 1995, Darth Vader was one of eight new figures (nine were planned but C-3PO was delayed because of production problems) that entered stores in July to immediate positive reception of collectors. We all knew that these figures didn’t necessarily imitate their onscreen counterparts too well, but it was so exciting to see new Star Wars figures hanging from the pegs that it trumped all the negativity that seemed to plague the line right from the start. Darth Vader, perhaps unbeknownst to many, had one issue that the other figures that made up the case assortment did not. It was sourced to the wrong film. Screen accuracy wasn’t necessarily at the forefront of action figure making in the mid nineties, so Kenner/Hasbro didn’t have to anal-retentively pay attention to every last detail to make collectors happy. (That would soon change with time as screen accuracy became the rule.)

Although the card back artwork and bio description source Darth Vader from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, this Darth Vader figure is actually based on the character’s appearance from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back. There are two major details which help prove this true. Firstly, the chest box has a blue switch. The costume from A New Hope had a green switch instead of a blue one. Secondly, and most obviously, the inner robes go over the chest armor in A New Hope. For the rest of the Original Trilogy, the inner robes went underneath the chest armor instead. Again, Kenner/Hasbro wasn’t preoccupied with such details when restarting this line, so it it totally understandable why things like this could be overlooked. Like all the other figures in The Power Of The Force “2” [Red] line, Darth Vader suffers from a very bulky frame and a helmet that really doesn’t favor the character from the films. Sadly, this Darth Vader figure is only recognizable as Darth Vader at best. A lot more work needs to go into an action figure version of this character before we give it our stamp of approval.

Darth Vader comes with two accessories. Kenner/Hasbro took the approach of a separately sculpted and removable cape. It’s rigid and sturdy and doesn’t change its shape at all. They’ve sculpted it in a way wear it perfectly wraps around the already existing sculpt of the figure. But even the slightest bit of articulation may inhibit the ability of the cape to lay flatly against the figure. You basically have one option to display this figure with the cape at that’s it. Darth Vader also comes with his signature red lightsaber. In the earliest case assortments, Darth Vader came with a super long lightsaber blade. This was eventually changed to a more reasonably sized blade. The collecting public went nuts over these different lightsaber variations to the point where it became complete insanity. But most collectors just wanted an “as accurate as possible” blade most and waited until the corrected version became a little more common at retail. Darth Vader is certainly nice to have in the modern line, but it’s going to need work before we consider it definitive.